race

My plan for the last race of the season was to hammer the swim and get a two minute lead onto the bike, minimize loss on the bike, and make up some time or pull further away on the run. In the three weeks leading up to the race, I focused on my swim and run and rode the bike at most 60 miles a week. One week out, just like before Pacific Grove, I couldn't run to save my life and I bonked on my last outdoor ride before the race. Between Pac Grove and this race, I'm learning that I'm one week off when I do a reverse taper. Good to know for the future. Unlike Pac Grove, however, I did bounce back by Tuesday of race week and I felt like my normal self. Four days before the race, a tanker hit the bay bridge and leaked oil throughout the SF Bay. On Friday, it was announced that the swim portion of the race would be canceled. There goes my race plan I thought. Needless to say, the morning of the race, I was absolutely relaxed and had no pre-race jitters as I really had nothing to compare ny final race of the season to since I had not done a duathlon in over 10 years. The race was not a real duathlon because we didn't start with a run, we simply did the bike and swim. Lining up for the race, I got some props from the announcer (Whit) as one of the guys to look out for in the race. I said a little prayer for mom like I usually do and dedicated my last race of the season to Jill. We ran to our bikes barefoot as though we just got out of the swim. I had an ok transition hopping on my bike in 5th or 6th place. Having never started a race with a bike ride, I was a bit lost out there. It felt like I was riding hard but as I came up onto my friend Troy, he asked me what the heck I was doing back there and why did it take me so long to catch him? The bike was a 6 lap course and after the first loop, I saw Roger Thompson (my nemesis, somehow, he and I always find each other on the course at races though he lives in Washington) with already a minute lead on me. Incredible, Not only is he a damn fast cyclist, I was contributing to his lead by riding exceptionally slow. Then Alan Archard, who I normally split about a minute slower on the bike, came flying by me and he was yelling at me for going so slow. At this point, I just put my head down and went full tilt. However, I suck at cornering and this course had tons of turns and on each one, I lost sight of Alan more and more. I was able to keep building until the last lap where I felt my right calf tighten up. I decided to slow, take some deep breaths and prepare myself for the run. My last lap was about 1 minute slower than what I was maintaining the previous three laps. Off the bike, my legs felt pretty good and no sign of the tight calf. Knowing that I was probably not in the top three, I took the first lap hard and was rewarded with my first age-group past. It was an out back loop and I saw Roger coming back and I doing the math, I knew I was over 6 minutes behind. By the turnaround, I was in second place for my age-group. On the next check point, I saw that I had made some time on Roger but I was still way behind him. I also realized that I had a big gap on third and this is where the mind becomes complacent. Realizing that I couldn't catch Roger and was safe from third, I backed off. Roger was an animal, he biked the same time as the pros like Hunter Kemper and Jarrod Shoemaker and the pro's got to draft. He rode 7 minutes faster than me, yikes, and that was basically his win margin. Props goes to my teammate Nick who did a great job of replacing Kim and Anne as the crazy, loud cheerleader. I'm now off to Australia for a little vacation which undoubtedly will be filled with a lot of swimming, biking, and running.